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Feywild
The Feywild, also known as the Plane of Faerie, is a plane and a twin of the mortal realm. Description The Feywild is a verdant, wild echo of the mortal realm. Towering forests sprawl for miles. Perfect amber prairies roll between pristine mountain peaks soaring into the flawless clouds. Emerald, turquoise and jade seas crash along endless beaches. The skies are a perfect blue unseen in the mortal world - until storms come, coal-dark thunderheads boiling with fierce winds and torrential rain. In this world, arcane power thrums through every rock and tree. All existence is magical. The geography of the Feywild parallels that of the mortal realm. Various mountains, rivers, and seas that are in the Feywild are also present in the natural world. However, the distances between landmarks in the Feywild - and the landmarks themselves - are often distorted. The natural landmarks in the mortal world are often exaggerated in the Plane of Faerie. Mountain peaks are higher, sharper, and more treacherous. Rivers that meander through the human world roar through the Feywild. Seas crash with waves driven by eldritch storms far offshore. Similarly, the Feywild also has an echo of the Underdark known as the Feydark. Built landmarks in the mortal world, such as cities, are nothing more than a hunting camp or even a small clearing in the fey forests. Distances between locations can even vary depending on which direction one is travelling. Visitors to the Feywild must also cope with stunning new sensory experiences. The tangible presence of magic in the Feywild is like nothing ever experienced on the mortal world. The flowers give off perfumes that can entrance unwary humans, and the Murk Sea can overwhelm even the hardiest of warriors. The powerful magic suffusing the plane makes everything, for lack of a better word, intensely real. Natives call this effect the Bright Beauty. Colours are more vivid, smells more pungent. Light doesn't scatter as it should. Every sight, sound, smell, and taste has a sharper edge. The Bright Beauty has a further effect on sentient creatures. Visitors begin to behave as purer, truer versions of themselves. Bold heroes become reckless, friends become lovers, and rivalries devolve into knife fights. Although adventurers never lose control, they must constantly fight the Feywild's call to the wild, the free, and the unrestrained within. Inhabitants *'Archfey' are the most powerful fey spirits and godlike avatars of their chosen aspect of nature. Some are noble eladrin so old and poweful that they have transcended the bounds of mortality while others are awakened spirits of mighty forests, mountains and rivers. Others are the sentient incarnations of different types of animals. Few of these beings are as powerful as a deity, but in their own demesnes, few other entities could hope to best them. The most powerful Archfey are Tiandra (also known as the Summer Queen), the Prince of Frost, and Green Lord Oran. *'Eladrin '''are the 'people' of the Feywild. Their cities are collections of sweeping, graceful towers married effortlessly to the local landscape. These cities all predate the war with the drow, and many were ravaged during the conflict. Only now are the eladrin attempting to reclaim their shattered metropolises, but repair and resettlement is uneven. Eladrin live over 300 years. *'Firbolgs''' are nocturnal hunters, the greatest of which are known as Masters of the Wild Hunt. They are relentless in their pursuit of enemies and game and are not above hunting other sentient beings. Not every firbolg hunt results in the death of their prey, for it is the hunt itself which gives meaning to these creatures. Their settlements are typically small and remote. *'Fomorians' are hideous creatures that dwell in the Feydark. In this terrifying maze of black tunnels and mystic caverns, these malformed giants rule with absolute tyranny over their vast underground kingdoms. Fomorians wield monstrous magical power, but this fell energy inflicts endless pain upon them and slowly drives them mad. Fomorians constantly wage war with the eladrin. *'Gnomes' are small creatures that live in warrens burrowed into the hills and forests of the Feywild. These burrows are hidden among the trees roots by cunning illusions. Gnome communities are governed by the Gnome Council, a pure meritocracy composed of subtle politicians, skilled magicians and cunning warriors. Gnomes were once slaves to the Fomorians. *'Hamadryads '''are the incarnate spirits of living oak trees. Part flesh, part wood, and part fey spirit, they are the supreme manifestations of nature's natural beauty. They are the intermediate point between the playful nymphs and the fierce dryads. All hamadryads are female and cannot die of old age. *'Pixies''' are an enchanted race born of raw fey magic and are the diminutive fairy folk of the Feywild. These childlike sprites have a penchant for mischievous fun, and there is no game a pixie will not play, no sport it will not attempt, no revelry it will avoid or decline. The first pixie is said to have been the daughter of Tiandra, the Summer Queen, and Corellon, the god of arcane magic. *'Satyrs' are a race branded by folklore as tricksters, hedonists, and charlatans. They resemble humans with the legs of goats, and are covered in fur from the waist down. All satyrs are male and live to be around 200 years of age. Locales *'Astrazalian', the City of Starlight, is the showpiece of the eladrin lands. Appearing on the hillsides of a green island of the mortal realm for fully half a year, it is the fey realm most well known to mortals. Every summer, mortal supplicants flood the city with trade and treasure. In the Feywild, the City of Starlight is within striking distance of the fomorian borderlands. To the power-mad giants, it is a greatly coveted prize waiting to be plucked. Astrazalian has a population of 8,900, plus an additional 5,000 who live in small estates elsewhere on the island. Most are eladrin, although some are elves or half-elves. *'Brokenstone Vale' is the land of the lycanthropes. This location is possibly the only safe haven for werebeasts in all of the planes, and was the location where a werewolf lord fought a long and bloody war against the eladrin. The edge of the vale has a few small huts for trading with the lycanthropes, although visitors are not welcome for long. The archfey known as the Maiden of the Moon has a special hatred for the inhabitants of this place. *'Cendriane' is a ruin that was once the most radiant of all the eladrin cities. It was once the location of the most vicious battle of the wars between the drow and eladrin, but the city-state is now a dark, twisted forest. Although the eladrin have long since fled, Cendriane is not empty. Giant spiders have spun webs between the towering spires, fey panthers hide in shattered doorways, and a pack of displacer beasts stalk the avenues. It is rumoured that a particularly violent circle of dryads and even a cult of vampires reside there. *'The Feydark' is similar to the Underdark in many respects its tunnels worm through the gutrock of the world for thousands of sunless miles. Vast caverns echo with the dull roar of underground rivers. Countless creatures hunt these catacombs, and entire civilisations rise and fall among the stone pillars. The walls of the Feydark are lined with bizarre fungi. Although many sentient beings roam these tunnels, the undisputed masters are the fomorians. *'The Isle of Dread '''is a vast tropical island of volcanic origin set amid stormy seas. The entire isle unpredictably shifts from the Feywild intto the mortal world, and occasionally appears in even stranger locations. As a result of this, the Isle of Dread is filled with all manners of strange beasts. Several tiny camps of shipwrecked sentient beings also dwell here. The island is rife with secrets, but one thing in clear - getting to the island is far easier than one might believe. Getting off is the challenge. *'Mag Tureah is aniron stronghold in the Feydark. Although it was once the centre of an ancient kingdom, it has now fallen into the hands of the fomorians. Although it is of value for its supreme defensive position, it is valued more for being a portal hub to every corner of the mortal world. However, most of these portals are unstable and regularly blink out of existence. Mag Tureah is currently ruled by Thrumbolg, the First Lord and the most powerful of all the fomorians. *'''Mithrendain, the Autumn City, is a beautiful eladrin forest-city whose buildings seem to grow naturally around the trees. The city is bereft of all methods of tracking the passage of time, making it seem timeless. A secret police force, known as the Watchers of the Night that can ignore Mithrendain's anti-illusion wards, patrol the city for signs of a fomorian invasion from the tunnels underneath the city. Mithrendain is home to nearly 40,000 citizens, most of whom are eladrin. *'The Murkendraw' is a swamp as large as a sea - a swamp of weeping willows and rotted fruit, of gnarled roots thrusting up from bubbling quicksand pits, of impenetrable fogbanks stinking of swamp gas, of week-long rainstorms where lightning scours the sodden ground, and of great dire alligators and swamp wasps the size of dogs. It is the home of hags, including the terrible Baba Yaga - the most powerful hag of all. *'Nachtur' is the largest and most powerful goblin kingdom in the Feywild. It is ruled over by the Great Gark, a hobgoblin wizard and the self-proclaimed Lord of All the Goblins. Nachtur is a crowded city-warren in the caves and tunnels beneath the rugged hills in the centre of a thickly wooded forest. Goblin archers and wolfriders patrol the region vigorously, harassing travellers and pillaging anything of value. The kingdom trades with nearby fomorian realms and often dispatches ambassadors to eladrin city-states. *'Senaliesse' is a primeval grove of silver trees that is the home of Queen Tiandra. Her palace sprawls out across the tops of countless gigantic oaks and yews. Tree limbs wide enough for several people are used as the main avenues between the ancient trees. Senaliesse is composed entirely of living wood coaxed by Lord Oran to form walls. It is the prime location for the irregular meetings of theCourt of Stars, a group of the most powerful archfey and eladrin in the Feywild. *'Shinaelestra', the Fading City, is a city of rangers that long ago allowed the forest to reclaim it. Many of Shinaelestra's towers are broken, trees rise from within roofless mansions, and many streets are impassable beneath thick undergrowth. However, the wilderness enroachment is a harmonius fall into ruin. Every midnight, the city shimmers into existence deep in a forest of the mortal world. The rangers hunt there until dawn, when it falls back into the Feywild. Shinaelestra occasionally battles the nearby fomorian realm of Vor Thomil. Category:World Backstory Category:Miscellaneous Lore Category:Official Pages